Perspectives

What I’m actually seeing.

Field reports, sourced commentary, and changes-of-mind from Philip J. Everett on AI in enterprise consulting, technology sales, and the deals actually closing in the room.

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Latest

AI · July 13, 2026 · 1 min read

The Token Bill Is the Audit

Everyone measured how often people used the tools. Nobody measured whether anything got better. Now the invoices are settling that argument.

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AI · July 9, 2026

Build-vs-Buy Just Became a Real Question Again

A coffee chain deciding it can out-build IBM isn't a demo win or a vendor obituary. It's a question most enterprises still aren't willing to ask themselves.

1 min read

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AI · July 7, 2026

The Embargo Is Building Its Own Competitor

Cut a lab off from the best chips and it doesn't stall. It goes vertical. And the enterprises that ruled out Chinese models over access risk should notice which direction that risk is now pointing.

1 min read

The archive

AI · July 2, 2026 · 1 min
The Summary Is Not the Source
An AI summary called a hotel being sued over hygiene 'spotless.' The same layer is reading your vendor risk reports, and nobody priced the difference.
AI · July 1, 2026 · 2 min
The Liability Is the Code Nobody Owns
An open-source project just banned AI-authored contributions with a line that should worry every enterprise counting AI code volume as a win. The number going up is not the thing that matters.
Consulting · June 22, 2026 · 1 min
A Vibe-Coded Clone Isn't the Moat
A top PE firm is rebuilding acquisition targets in a weekend to test their defenses. The framing is diligence efficiency. The real use is pricing power, and it cuts both ways.
AI · June 20, 2026 · 1 min
The Hype Is Crowding Out the Boring AI That Works
A former game-studio AI exec says generative hype is poisoning the well for everything else. He's got a prior worth scrutinizing, and a point worth taking seriously.
AI · June 18, 2026 · 1 min
There's No Rulebook Behind the AI Export Crackdown
One AI vendor gets ordered to cut a customer off over unproven China ties. Another sells frontier models into China the same week with no apparent friction. If you're trying to write a vendor-compliance policy off that, good luck.
AI · June 17, 2026 · 2 min
Your AI ROI Runs On a Subsidized Rate
The ROI math on most enterprise AI work is built on a price that isn't real yet. Two sets of vendor financials this week say the bill is already moving.
AI · June 16, 2026 · 1 min
Your Dev Toolchain Just Became a Conglomerate Asset
A $60 billion price tag is the headline. The procurement question nobody's asking is the part that should keep you up at night.
AI · June 15, 2026 · 2 min
The Invoice Was Never the Cost
A $200 subscription that costs the vendor $14,000 to fulfill isn't a consumer curiosity. It's the bill enterprise CFOs signed for without reading the meter.
AI · June 14, 2026 · 1 min
The Knowledge Left With the Analysts
London finance analyst vacancies fell from 350 to 80. Everyone's reading it as a warning. It's the wrong tense. The adjustment already happened, and the real question isn't who lost a job.
AI · June 13, 2026 · 2 min
No SLA Covers a Government Kill Switch
Enterprises bought frontier model access like a software subscription. Washington just showed it's a regulated export commodity that can vanish overnight, with no transition window and no contract to fall back on.
AI · June 12, 2026 · 1 min
The Partner Label Is Marketing
A foundation model lab called two design firms "partners," then shipped a product that competes with them. If you haven't read your AI vendor relationships the same way, you're one announcement behind.
AI · June 11, 2026 · 2 min
AI Contracts Are Pricing In Stability That Isn't There
A token price cut sounds like a win for buyers. If you've locked terms for three years, it's the opposite. Here's what the price war is actually telling procurement teams.
AI · June 10, 2026 · 1 min
The AI-Gets-Cheaper Assumption Is the Weak Joint
Most enterprise AI business cases quietly assume the per-token cost line keeps falling. The infrastructure layer is pushing the other way from three directions at once.
AI · June 9, 2026 · 2 min
Your AI Threat Model Was Written for the Wrong War
Enterprises governed what the model might leak. Two events this week show they skipped the harder question: what the tool itself can do, and what can be done to it.
AI · June 8, 2026 · 1 min
AI Skill Debt Doesn't Show Up Until You Need It
A worker who ships clean output and a worker who understands what they shipped look identical on a dashboard. They stop looking identical the first time something breaks.
AI · June 7, 2026 · 2 min
Washington Applause Is a Lagging Indicator
A gala full of generals and lobbyists toasted American AI this week while the public kept souring and the lawsuits kept stacking. If your AI strategy is tuned to that applause, you're calibrating to the wrong signal.
AI · June 6, 2026 · 1 min
You Can't Govern the Bill You Can't See
A $920M/month compute lease just showed up in an SEC filing. It won't show up in your vendor's pricing sheet. That gap is the whole problem.
AI · June 5, 2026 · 2 min
The AI Vendor Risk Your MSA Can't Reach
Procurement teams have been arguing about indemnification clauses while the actual exposure walked in the front door wearing a flag pin.
AI · June 1, 2026 · 2 min
Export Controls Can't Catch Corporate Structure
Commerce posted chip guidance on a Sunday. The interesting part isn't what it banned. It's what it admitted by existing at all.
AI · May 31, 2026 · 1 min
Per-Seat AI Pricing Was Always Temporary
Calling GitHub's token billing a fumble misses what's actually happening across the AI tooling stack. The seat-license era is ending on purpose, and most finance teams are budgeted for the wrong shape of bill.
AI · May 27, 2026 · 2 min
Retrospective Candor Is Still Candor
Uber's COO said the quiet part out loud about AI ROI — but only after burning the year's budget. The timing is the whole story, and it isn't the story you've been told this week.
AI · May 26, 2026 · 3 min
China's Talent Is the New Chokepoint
Beijing just extended travel restrictions to senior AI staff at Alibaba and DeepSeek. The mechanism looks like a mirror of US chip controls. It isn't, and the difference is the part buyers should be reading twice.
AI · May 25, 2026 · 3 min
AI's Toll-Road Turn Has Started
Google and Anthropic trimmed their models. The bear case says enterprises stop paying. The smart money just bet the opposite, on the company doing the trimming.
AI · May 24, 2026 · 3 min
The Bifurcation Tax Is Coming Due
Enterprises that signed AI platform contracts in 2024 priced one curve. The market is now moving along two — in opposite directions — and the renewal cycle is about to find out.
AI · May 23, 2026 · 5 min
The Procurement Scissors Are Closing
Inflated ARR on one side, runaway usage costs on the other, and procurement contract language built for a previous decade in between. The math behind most enterprise AI business cases is getting squeezed.
AI · May 22, 2026 · 3 min
Procurement Theater Comes Due
Starbucks killed its AI inventory tool nine months in. The same week, the people who built the vibe-coding boom started warning their own output is dangerous. Same failure, two layers of the stack — and it isn't where the headlines say.
AI · May 21, 2026 · 2 min
Anthropic's Profitable Quarter Is an Accounting Choice
A company spending $15 billion a year on compute doesn't hit operating profit on $10.9 billion in quarterly revenue by accident. It picks where to put the costs.
AI · May 20, 2026 · 3 min
Read the Org Chart, Not the Memo
A bank CEO said the quiet part loud about AI replacing workers, then his communications team rewrote him. The same week, a leaked memo at a different company said something stranger.
AI · May 19, 2026 · 5 min
AI Infrastructure Has New Landlords
Blackstone is taking majority ownership of a new Google AI cloud company. Nobody covering the deal has named the clause that survives a change of control.
AI · May 18, 2026 · 3 min
The Shared-Target Tax Arrives
Linus Torvalds says AI bug hunters have made the Linux security list 'almost entirely unmanageable.' The bigger story isn't kernel maintainers — it's what's already pointed at every enterprise vendor inbox.
AI · May 17, 2026 · 2 min
The Validation Debt Comes Due
Twenty out of twenty AI medical scribes failed an Ontario audit the same week OpenAI gave a chatbot read access to your bank account. Different sectors, same gap, and nobody's pricing it.
AI · May 16, 2026 · 3 min
Where the Hallucinations Got Through
Two retractions in a week, one in consulting and one in research preprints. The shared failure isn't the model. It's what the review layer was never built to catch.
AI · May 15, 2026 · 4 min
Clinical AI's Missing Denominator
The Ontario audit reads as another AI hallucination story. Read it again. The detail the coverage is missing isn't in the failures — it's in the question the audit forces every procurement officer to answer.
AI · May 14, 2026 · 5 min
Two-Thirds of Doctors, Zero Procurement Trail
A hospital legal team can't deposition a tool the hospital didn't buy. That's the upstream phase healthcare is sitting in, and Bentonville just showed how the downstream phase prices in.
AI · May 10, 2026 · 3 min
The Ratepayer Subsidy Powering AI
Maryland just asked FERC to stop a $2B grid bill from landing on residential ratepayers to fund out-of-state AI data centers. It's the AI infrastructure story enterprise buyers should be tracking and aren't.
AI · May 9, 2026 · 3 min
The AI Dividend Picks a Direction
Cloudflare just put AI on the receipt for 1,100 layoffs at record revenue. That makes the productivity story real and the 'AI creates more jobs' argument harder to sustain. The dividend has a direction.
AI · May 8, 2026 · 4 min
The Speed Mismatch on AI
CNN says Wall Street is finally pressing on AI returns. The NYT op-ed page says federal policy isn't moving fast enough on AI risk. Two pieces, two sections of the paper, opposite framings, same underlying story. The systems around AI weren't built to operate at AI's clock speed.

The Token Bill Is the Audit

Build-vs-Buy Just Became a Real Question Again

The Embargo Is Building Its Own Competitor

The archive

The Summary Is Not the Source

The Liability Is the Code Nobody Owns

A Vibe-Coded Clone Isn't the Moat

The Hype Is Crowding Out the Boring AI That Works

There's No Rulebook Behind the AI Export Crackdown

Your AI ROI Runs On a Subsidized Rate

Your Dev Toolchain Just Became a Conglomerate Asset

The Invoice Was Never the Cost

The Knowledge Left With the Analysts

No SLA Covers a Government Kill Switch

The Partner Label Is Marketing

AI Contracts Are Pricing In Stability That Isn't There

The AI-Gets-Cheaper Assumption Is the Weak Joint

Your AI Threat Model Was Written for the Wrong War

AI Skill Debt Doesn't Show Up Until You Need It

Washington Applause Is a Lagging Indicator

You Can't Govern the Bill You Can't See

The AI Vendor Risk Your MSA Can't Reach

Export Controls Can't Catch Corporate Structure

Per-Seat AI Pricing Was Always Temporary

Retrospective Candor Is Still Candor

China's Talent Is the New Chokepoint

AI's Toll-Road Turn Has Started

The Bifurcation Tax Is Coming Due

The Procurement Scissors Are Closing

Procurement Theater Comes Due

Anthropic's Profitable Quarter Is an Accounting Choice

Read the Org Chart, Not the Memo

AI Infrastructure Has New Landlords

The Shared-Target Tax Arrives

The Validation Debt Comes Due

Where the Hallucinations Got Through

Clinical AI's Missing Denominator

Two-Thirds of Doctors, Zero Procurement Trail

The Ratepayer Subsidy Powering AI

The AI Dividend Picks a Direction

The Speed Mismatch on AI

The Token Bill Is the Audit

Build-vs-Buy Just Became a Real Question Again

The Embargo Is Building Its Own Competitor

The archive

The Summary Is Not the Source

The Liability Is the Code Nobody Owns

A Vibe-Coded Clone Isn't the Moat

The Hype Is Crowding Out the Boring AI That Works

There's No Rulebook Behind the AI Export Crackdown

Your AI ROI Runs On a Subsidized Rate

Your Dev Toolchain Just Became a Conglomerate Asset

The Invoice Was Never the Cost

The Knowledge Left With the Analysts

No SLA Covers a Government Kill Switch

The Partner Label Is Marketing

AI Contracts Are Pricing In Stability That Isn't There

The AI-Gets-Cheaper Assumption Is the Weak Joint

Your AI Threat Model Was Written for the Wrong War

AI Skill Debt Doesn't Show Up Until You Need It

Washington Applause Is a Lagging Indicator

You Can't Govern the Bill You Can't See

The AI Vendor Risk Your MSA Can't Reach

Export Controls Can't Catch Corporate Structure

Per-Seat AI Pricing Was Always Temporary

Retrospective Candor Is Still Candor

China's Talent Is the New Chokepoint

AI's Toll-Road Turn Has Started

The Bifurcation Tax Is Coming Due

The Procurement Scissors Are Closing

Procurement Theater Comes Due

Anthropic's Profitable Quarter Is an Accounting Choice

Read the Org Chart, Not the Memo

AI Infrastructure Has New Landlords

The Shared-Target Tax Arrives

The Validation Debt Comes Due

Where the Hallucinations Got Through

Clinical AI's Missing Denominator

Two-Thirds of Doctors, Zero Procurement Trail

The Ratepayer Subsidy Powering AI